Vegas with the Squirrel, Pt. 2

That next morning the Squirrel headed to her conference. I was going to hit the pool for a little while so I headed down a little before 9am, but the pool at the Excalibur doesn’t open until 10am. I really didn’t want to just wait an hour up in the room to go to the pool, so I cleaned up and headed down for a late breakfast and a leisurely stroll over to the Wynn for an early session of poker.

I got a seat at a $2/$5 No-Limit table and bought in for $300. As I got to my seat I was witnessing someone’s pocket Aces being cracked by the player who was going to be on my right’s hand of 2-6. I don’t know all the details of that hand, but it was a huge pot, and my first impression of the player on my right was that he was loose. This was confirmed during my first half hour at the table. He was a foreign gentleman, and had a friend sitting behind him. He was also playing almost every hand. Often times he would show his friend his cards at the end of the hand, and because of my position at the table he was exposing his cards to me as well. Since it wasn’t during the middle of play I decided to just make mental notes about what he was showing. More often than not he was usually bluffing on the river by just placing a large bet out there. No one would call and he would take down the pot. Using that information I was planning to try and get involved with him in a big pot when I was holding a huge hand.

Things appeared to be going my way when, after this guy raised to $25 to open the pot, I looked down and found pocket Kings (KK). I just called the $25, hoping that he would follow up on the flop with a bet. Well, both the blinds called after I call. The flop came: Jack-8-3. Both blinds check, and my “mark” bet $125. I was up a little since I sat down, but I only had $350 or so, and I decided that now was the time to try to take this pot down in case he had a piece of it already I didn’t want to allow him to draw to a better hand for free. I moved all in. The first blind folded, but the other blind moved all in for less than what I had. THAT wasn’t good. I was almost certain that I was beat when that happened. About the only hand I would be beating there would be AJ, but I was guessing that the blind had either 8-8 or 3-3. Then it got back to the initial raiser on my right. I was initially hoping he would call since he had enough chips to cover me, and I could still win a side pot (although the side pot would be about $200 and I’d still lose on the hand overall). Well, he’s thinking about it when he asks the dealer if he can show me his hand. Since all the other action was complete the dealer informed him he could and then he showed me…pocket Aces!! He still hadn’t called yet, and now I was praying he’d fold since I basically had no shot at either pot. After a couple minutes he came to the conclusion that he couldn’t fold for the $200 or so it would cost him and he called. My instincts were correct about the other guy, too, unfortunately, as he turned over 8-8 for a set of 8s. No King arrived, and it was time to rebuy.

The decision to rebuy was easy with the action that table was generating. I felt I just got real unlucky that both Aces and Kings happened to be dealt at the same time (with me getting the Kings). So I bought back in for $300, and started working my stack up, slowly, but I had managed to get it up to $540. The foreign guy on my right had left about 1½ hours ago, but he had been replaced by a player who was just as aggressive, but wasn’t playing as many hands, although he was playing more than most players at the table. It was at this point when I was dealt KJsuited and this player raises to $25. I decided to call and see what the flop would bring. Everyone else got out of the way, and the flop was: K-J-4. Wow! Top two pair! My opponent led out and bet $50, and with my two pair I thought I’d lay a trap and call. The turn card was a Jack! This now gave me a full house, Jacks full of Kings. My opponent led out and bet again, this time $75. I decided to make the minimum raise to $150. I’m really hoping he’s either got a King or a Jack. I was hoping it was the Jack since it would be very hard to get away from trip Jacks here. Well, he thinks for a minute and decides to raise to $400. To call that it would only leave me with $100, so I knew he would call my reraise of all in and that’s what I did almost immediately. He called just as quickly and turned over…pocket Kings! ARE YOU F---ING KIDDING ME?!? Obviously, his pocket Kings gave him a better full house, and since the last Jack in the deck didn’t hit the river (why the hell should I get lucky?) to give me four of a kind I lost that pot. Yes, I’m bitter. That one hurt. If I had been thinking a little earlier, I would have gone and grabbed something to eat as it would have given me the opportunity to pull chips off the table; something you cannot do during play. It was getting close to time for me to leave so I could be back at the Excalibur by 5 o’clock, so I decided NOT to rebuy again and I headed back to the Excalibur to meet up with the Squirrel for dinner.

I got back to the Excalibur, and while I was in the room waiting for the Squirrel, the room phone rings, and it’s the Squirrel asking me to meet her at the elevator to let her up. I agreed and headed down. I assumed that she had left her room key in the room, and the guard at the bottom by the elevators won’t let you up without showing a room key. How I wished that were the case! I found out when I got down there that the Squirrel had dropped her wallet in the cab and had lost her cash, ID, room key, and credit cards! We tried to see if the cab was out front, but no such luck.

Here I thought I was having a bad day because of poker! My day sounds pretty good compared to that! We got back up to the room and called all the cab companies to report the lost items, but we weren’t getting anywhere as far as tracking the items down. Then she called to cancel her credit cards. There was also a new problem. I had cash on me, but when I go to Vegas I typically leave my credit card and debit card at home to not be “tempted” to use them, so I didn’t have an easy way to access cash. The Squirrel had no way of getting any, and I just lost $600 playing poker earlier. I was slightly worried that we might have to get by on what I had left for cash. I had plenty for gambling for myself, but to cover both of us along with meals and hotel, that would have been another story. After canceling the cards and after she had called home to apprise her hubby of the situation we got a late supper and turned in early for the night.

As it turned out, the next morning, the Squirrel was able to hit a bank in Las Vegas that also has branches back home that she banks at, explain her situation, and cash a check, so that part of the problem was now resolved. I did find out during the course of this that this wasn't the first, or even the second time that this has happened to the Squirrel, but actually this was the THIRD time this happened to her while out of town. Note to self: pick up a wallet with a chain for the Squirrel for Christmas, unless she's going out of town before Christmas, then get it sooner. :) We never heard back from any of the cab companies, and the wallet and credit cards were never recovered. That really sucked. Our trip wasn’t over yet, though…

Vegas with the Squirrel, Pt. 1

I had an opportunity to go to Vegas in early September and decided to go. A friend of mine, the Squirrel (a nickname, obviously), was attending a work-related conference there. Her husband, with whom I bowl with and also play poker, was unable to go to Vegas, and she didn’t really want to go to Vegas by herself, so the opportunity for me to go with a room all set was there as long as I could come up with the flight. I used some of my frequent flier miles, and lo and behold, I had a very cheap Vegas trip!

The trip occurred during the opening week of the football season, and the Packers were playing that Monday night against the Vikings. We couldn’t miss that, so after I had my first poker session in the books and after the Squirrel had arrived we headed to the ESPNZone at the NY, NY casino to eat and take in the game. Of course, we got some wagers in on the game and some other games, too. I even was able to bet on the U.S. Tennis Open Championship thanks to the Sunday rainout in New York. I was fortunate to win on most of the sports bets. Packers win: check. Raiders get blown out by Denver: check. Federer wins U.S. Open: check. Packers cover prop bet: oops. Brewers win to give me my 3-team parlay: oops. Oh, well. Can’t win ‘em all.

After the game the Squirrel and I played some craps at NY, NY, and at the Excalibur. The Squirrel hadn’t played a whole lot of craps before so I played the role of instructor and guide while we were playing. For those of you that don’t know I also have served the function of a craps “dealer” at parties over the years. I used to work about 15-20 parties a year, with most occurring during the holiday season, but now I probably work only a handful during a year, if that. Now that I think about it, I think the last party I worked was this past January. It’s been a while. Anyway, I know the game rather well, and can follow pretty much every bet that’s on the table at any given time so not only can I help a person play craps to reduce the house’s edge as much as possible, I also make sure all the bets are placed properly and paid so that my friends don’t get overlooked. At a busy craps table a bet can sometimes be missed by one of the dealers, and if you don’t point it out you could very easily miss out getting paid. The Squirrel and I had a good time playing craps, and with the Squirrel’s conference starting early, we called it a night at a reasonable hour.

I know, I know...I've been busy.

I know I haven't posted anything new in the last couple weeks. I'll try to take care of that this week and weekend. I've been real busy since the second week of September. I've been to Vegas and have a couple good stories from there, had a pair of work trips in Washington, D.C., and NY, NY, went to the Packers-Cowboys game, went to the second to last game of the regular season for the Brewers in conjunction with a very long bachelor party, and went to the Brewers first playoff game at home. I do have some pictures from most of the stuff and I'll be posting those, too. I need to get this stuff posted because at the end of the month I'll be traveling to the United Kingdom for work, and I don't want to be too far behind before I go! I'm so excited about that trip!

Tournament of Champions - Part 2

Sorry about the delay between posts for the Tournament of Champions. There’s been a lot going on lately. I believe we left off where I had just won a significant pot because I got extremely lucky when I was trying to steal the blinds…

Because I had the chip lead I felt no real need to push too hard against my opponents as I wanted them to start chipping away at each other. This strategy was working well as I watched a couple of the other players take each other out. I picked up the occasional strong hand and was able to play back at some people as well. On one such occasion Dan, aka “Highway A”, had raised a pot where I picked up a pair of Queens and my reraise was able to force Dan to lay his hand down.

While this was going on Mark, who also is the league’s director, was starting to pick up some chips and had about half as many as I did. I looked around to see where all my opponents were at, and the approximate chip positions were:

Myself, 11000

Mark, ~5500

everyone else, <3000

With the chip positions as they were the only player that could hurt me significantly was Mark. He also happened to be seated on my immediate left, which is a bad spot for me to have him at the table. It was this fact that started my decline. We were at six players, and I found myself holding Ace-Ten. I was in early position so I raised. At a six-handed table Ace-Ten has a slightly better than 50% chance to be the best hand dealt. After I raised Mark reraised. Everyone else folded, and the action was back to me. Mark’s reraise had put in about 40% of his stack so I really didn’t think he’d be able to fold his hand. Also, I’m sure Mark was aware of the chip stacks and the fact that I was the only one who could knock him out at the moment so I decided that his hand had to be pretty strong if he was going to risk getting knocked out at this stage of the tournament. I decided to fold. That obviously put Mark and I a little closer to each other in chips.

This incident wouldn’t have made the blog except for the fact that this scenario happened two more times within about a 40 minute span. I raise, Mark reraises, and then I fold. The two times it happened after that I had Ace-Nine, which I folded for very much the same reasons as I explained earlier, and then it happened again when I was stealing with Ace-Three. That time I was banking on the fact that Mark just couldn’t keep catching hands when I was. Well, I guess I was wrong. It was that, or he just realized that he was able to steal from me in that position. Either way, it was working for him and it was killing my chip stack. After those hands took place we had basically flip flopped chip positions.

Mark was also scooping some pots by eliminating opponents. He managed to eliminate Rock when Mark got it all in preflop with 7-7 against Rock’s Q-Q. The action had gone: Mark raised, Rock reraised all in, and Mark called. Given the action I was very surprised to see what Mark was holding, but he must have known something I didn’t since the river (last card) was a 7, giving Mark a set of 7s and sending Rock to the rail. I was eliminated shortly after that when I got it all in with AQ against Don’s pair of 3s and I didn’t win the coin flip. That crippled me and I went out in 4^th place a couple of hands after that.

The final three were set, and it was at this point that Don decided to get a little creative with his raising of the pot. To fully understand what happened here you have to know that in poker, if you announce your action your statement is binding. If you don’t say anything and perform an action then that action is binding, but it must be done all at once. Well, Don announced that he as going to raise to 2400, but when he put his chips out he only put out 1400. No problem, we pointed out the “accidental” mistake and it was corrected because he announced his bet. On the very next hand, Don decided to raise again, but this time he put out 400 less than what he announced. Once again, we had him correct it, but now it was time to definitely give him a hard time about his ability to count chips. A couple hands go by, and then Don wanted to raise again. This time he grabbed his chips ahead of time, was made sure to look at me as he announced in a mocking tone, “I’m raising to 2400. Does that look right this time?” To which Adam replied, “Well, you only put 1400 out there again, so you owe another 1000!” Now, I know Don wasn’t doing this intentionally, but it was too hard to pass up ripping him for the mistakes. By the way, did I mention he’s a teacher of children? I’m guessing that those children are not our future. I sure hope those poor kids can pass their math tests!! Just kidding ya, Don.

Shortly after that Mark, now known as the “River King”, got involved in a pot with Pete. In an unraised pot, the flop had shown up with the following three cards: Ad-8d-something non diamond. Pete moved all in, and Mark decided to call. Pete turned over Kd-9d giving him the nut flush draw, and Mark turned over 7d-3d. Mark was down to only six outs, and he also had to dodge any diamond in the process! Well, the turn card missed both players, and the river was a 3, giving Mark the win and eliminating Pete.

The heads-up battle between Mark and Don didn’t last too long. The hand that crowned the champion played out like this:

In an unraised pot, the flop came Kx-8x-X. Both players check the flop. The turn was a 4. After a bet by Don and a raise by Mark, Don shoved all in. Mark thought about it and called. Don table a King for top pair, and Mark showed J4 for bottom pair. Mark needed to catch either a Jack or 4 on the river to win, and as Adam dealt the last card it was a…4!! Mark won again on the river! Mark was very gracious in his win as I think even he realized how lucky he got on those three hands…three rivers!! Wow! This, friends, is the “class of the CCPL”. Make a note of Mark's pose here as I think I can sum it up as "F.U.! Look at these hands and your new CCPL Champ!"

Tournament of Champions - Part 1

Last weekend the final tournament of the second season of the Cream City Poker League (CCPL) took place. Adam was kind enough to host the championship, and the five returning champions of the seven events along with the next two highest players from the point’s standings and the two winners from the play-in event came together to form the Championship Table. As a wrinkle to the tournament structure, every player received an amount of bonus chips that was determined based on the number of points earned throughout the season, so the stacks were not even to begin the tournament.

I started with the lead in chips based on my season results, but I found myself not really able to use that advantage since I was almost getting no decent hands to start the tournament. Even when I would find myself with a borderline starting hand the players acting in front of me were raising and reraising often, eliminating any advantage I might have by getting in to the pot. So I waited…and waited…and waited.

Meanwhile one of the players, Pete S., was either getting a lot of good hands or changed his style of play significantly for this event, as it was he who seemed to be doing the most raising preflop. Other players were even pointing this out when he had raised from the first position, known as Under the Gun, several times in a row.

Also, Dan seemed to be having a good time at the tournament, seeing as he was in conversations with other players often times when it was his turn to act. It was just after he had raked a pot and was informing the rest of us that a “new groove was being formed on the table where all the chips would funnel to” him, just like “Highway A leaving Lake Delton” in the Dells when he gave himself the nickname “Highway A”. It had also been Dan’s turn to act for almost a minute while this proclamation took place. It had to be pointed out to Dan regularly that it was his turn to act. Eventually he picked up the pace on his turn.

I was still waiting to get some good hands. I managed to pick up the blinds once when a got a medium pair to raise with preflop, and had picked up a small pot when I bet a flush draw in another pot where everyone had missed the board. Because I had been playing so few hands, and it had been noticed by a couple players that I had been playing so few hands, I thought I would try to pull a steal from the cutoff position, which is one before the dealer, regardless of what I was holding the next time I was in the cutoff. When that position came up I found myself holding: Js – 2s. Not a great holding, but I was hoping that my tight image would hold up for the steal. I raised, the button folded, and Adam and Adam, who were in the blinds, both decided to call. As soon as that happened I had planned to give up the hand, but the flop produced something that I wasn’t expecting when it hit:

Jc – 7c – 2x

giving me two pair! Adam led out with about a 2/3 pot bet, and the other Adam thought about it and moved all in behind him! That brought the action to me. I really didn’t think that all three of us could have hit the board so well, and I believed one of the Adams was on a flush draw. I moved all in, hoping that if the first Adam was on the flush draw it would not give him the proper pot odds to call and he’d lay it down. Adam thought about it for a while, and after thinking he had the pot odds to call decided to also call, so now two of us were at risk to be knocked out of the tournament because of this hand (the Adam hosting, and myself). Adam turned over QJoff and knew he was behind because of my moving in, and then the other Adam turned over AJ, which really hurt the other Adam. I showed my two pair, to which everyone was surprised to see that hand. Adam called for the board to pair, which would have been fine for me as long as it wasn’t a 7 or running pair of cards. My hand held up, and I nearly tripled up in the hand. I was very surprised to see the AJ in that situation, especially since he had led out with a bet, was raised, and then reraised again by the initial raiser. I would have thought that third raise would indicated the overpair, the set, or two pair (two pair being the most unlikely with that flop). At the very least I would have thought that top pair could be thrown away there. Oh well.

After I had amassed that stack of chips, I started getting some hands, too. It was with that stack that got me to the later stages of the tournament, but I’ll save some of that action for the next post…

Tournament of Champions Preview

This post is just a teaser for the next couple of posts for this blog. This past weekend the Tournament of Champions II was held for the Cream City Poker League. The game featured a whole lot of hands and action. During the course of play there was the usual discussion of playing poker “by the book”, and I think it was decided that the following chapters will be added to the book when the CCPL decides to author it:

Chapter 1: How to Steal the Blinds from Under the Gun – by Pete S.
Step 1. Play tight for three years, then raise the hell out of everyone when out of position

Chapter 2: Stealing the Blinds from Late Position and Tripling Up – by Jason F.
Step 1. Pick a poor starting hand to raise with and pump up the pot
Step 2. After blinds both call, make sure you hit two-pair or better and get them to bet in front of you.

Chapter 3: Knowing When It’s Your Turn to Act – by Dan N.
Step 1. Start up a conversation with someone right after the person on your right makes decision with cards.
Step 2. Give yourself a nickname
Step 3. Wait for the table to get irritated with the delay and have them insist you perform an action

Chapter 4: Knowing the Right Amount to Bet – by Don L.
Step 1. Verbally announce your bet, then put out a thousand less. See if anyone notices
Step 2. After everyone notices, try again on the next hand, but only short the pot by 400 instead of a thousand.
Step 3. Grab chips ahead of time, prepare for the raise, announce it and prepare to make sure everyone knows you did it right, but actually short the pot by 1000…AGAIN.

Chapter 5: Late Stages of the Tournament: Closing the Deal – by Mark S.
Step 1. Get your chips in as a 80%+ underdog at least 3 times
Step 2. On the river, get the card you need to eliminate opponents

I'm telling ya, if you follow these chapters in the book, you too, can become a great poker player...

I'll give a little more detail about each of these in the next few posts!!

Brewers vs. Cubs and the Bob & Brian Open

I was really looking forward to this past Thursday and Friday. Mike was coming in to town, and Mike, Todd, Dan, and myself were heading to the finale of the four-game series taking place between the Brewers and the Cubs. The four of us only get the opportunity to get together a couple times a year (at most), and we usually golf the Bob and Brian Open on the first Friday in August, so it was pretty nice that we were able to hang out a couple days together. Dan provided the tickets (Thanks again!). The tickets were for excellent seats in the lower level between home plate and first base. Unfortunately, the Brewers didn't have their A-game with them on Thursday (or Monday, or Tuesday, or Wednesday) and the Cubs ended up winning the game and sweeping the series. We did leave in the bottom of the 8th inning, so we missed most of the Brewers scoring as they scored 3 of their 4 runs in the bottom of the 9th. They only needed 7 more runs to tie, though...

Friday started out bright and early, as we all met at Dan's house at 6:00am to head over to the Bob and Brian Open. If you aren't familiar with "Bob and Brian", they are a pair of local DJs that run a morning show in the Milwaukee area. Each year, on the first Friday in August, they have a golf outing they run as a fund raiser for the MACC fund (Midwest Athletes Against Childhood Cancer). It's a great time as they have 36 holes and at least two foursomes starting on each hole. They even have enough golfers to run two shifts, one at 7:30am and one at 1:30pm. We were in the early start.


After arriving at the golf course we dropped our clubs at the club drop, checked in, and then went looking for our carts so that we could snag a couple clubs to go practice at the range. Mike's and Todd's clubs were at their carts, but Dan's and mine had been mysteriously "misplaced". After searching all over we discovered that our clubs were never making it on to the carts to be delivered to the golfer's carts. So much for practice! There seemed to be some long lines at the check-in area, too. Overall, I didn't think it was run as well as it has been in the past. Hopefully, they'll improve on that for next year.

The weather started out great, and we never had to worry about rain or getting enough sunshine because it was sunny all day. It was REALLY humid though, so about 11:00 or so it started to get real warm out there on the fairways and greens. We didn't have the greatest of golf scores as we only posted a 3-under 68, but we always know going in to the outing that we aren't going to post the best score, as usually some group comes in with some ridiculous score of 20-under par or something like that. We had a good time though. I did manage a pretty nice chip in for an eagle on a par 5, but that was my only highlight of the day.